Sunshiny March!

Oh how I am welcoming the sunshine that has become the trend over the last week! Actually, I have to say that this winter has not been nearly as bad for light as I had feared. I think it may have something to do with the snow and the light that reflects off of it but I have not found myself lacking for light this winter at all. That said, I am still rejoicing at the longer days and the sunshine that is warming them up!

We had a very busy weekend - aside from keeping up with the Olympic Events and medal count - YAY CANADA!!! -　we were experiencing all we could of the Japanese culture. On Friday afternoon I had a meeting with Kabara-san at the Ootaki office about staying for another year. There were a couple of details that needed to be addressed and he is contacting the Date Board of Education about it but it's looking more and more like we're here until the summer of 2011. I was a bit devastated to hear that Kabara-san is retiring this month as I've grown quite fond of him and it's totally fun to try my pathetic Japanese on him and make him laugh! I hope the new guy will be as kind and helpful.

On Saturday Ian and Joisan and I went to Sobetsu to watch some of the Yukigassen (literally: snow battle). There were many teams competing and although it was not exactly how Ian had pictured it, it was still fun to watch. It is quite a big deal here - many of the teams had special uniforms and everything! There were about 9 or 10 people to a team. They played on a fairly small field that had a few blocks of snow on each side to take cover behind. Each team had the same number of snow balls and if you get hit you're out. The games are timed and at the end the team with the most players still in the game is the winner. While we were there we went to visit Ato-san who had his deer burger booth set up. We had a quick visit and then left to get Joisan to her friends house for a lunch date. We still had to do the ballet-run after her visit at Akari's house and then after dinner Ato-san and his friend and his daughter came over to do some drinking. It was fun!

On Sunday Joisan and I went on a hike to Nyoro Nyoro. It is a cave here in Otaki that gets some amazing icicles growing up from the floor and down from the ceiling. It takes about an hour to hike to it - along a narrow, snow covered ridge. We managed to hold our place at the end of the line quite well! Ato-san's daughter Misuzu came with us - which was a little uncomfortable since there was another girl who came along with her parents and she is the target of a lot of bullying by Misuzu. Ugh. Thirteen year old girls are fun! Anyway, we have some photos which I will post today if possible!

When Joisan and I got home we found Ian and Taran watch tv and shivering under blankets. We had run out of oil :( I made a couple of calls and managed to get a plan in place to make it through the night. Naoko and I took a jerry can to Sobetsu where there was a fuel station open. We bought 18L of heating oil and we were optimistic once we got it in that things would be fine. Of course it wasn't that easy. We had to get Ato-san and one of his buddies to come and help us bleed the lines before it would work. Oh - heat is a wonderful thing!

School is going fine - we're in wrap-up mode for the end of the school year. Naoko and I have the grade 1's and 2's working on plays right now. I've done scripts of a couple of Robert Munsch books - Pigs and Mortimer - and we're working on understanding the words right now. We're going to perform it at the Warashibe in two weeks.

There's not much excitement planned for the next few weeks. Joisan will finally have her birthday party on the 13th. She'll be starting grade 8 in April with her class here and I've arranged for her to start the BC grade 8 core subjects at the same time. The kids are still not thrilled about the idea of staying for another year so I'm hoping that we'll get some visitors over the next year that will cheer them up. Hint hint!!!